Original artwork © Elizabeth Gober
| Frequency: |
Very Rare |
| Organization: |
Solitary |
| Activity Cycle: |
Any |
| Diet: |
Life Energy |
| Intelligence: |
10-12 |
| Treasure: |
P |
| Alignment: |
Lawful Evil |
| No. Appearing: |
1d4 |
| Armor Class: |
2 (-2) |
| Movement: |
15 [Fly 24 (A)] |
| Hit Dice: |
8+10 |
| THACO: |
11 |
| No. of Attacks: |
2 |
| Damage/Attack: |
1d4/1d4 |
| Special Attacks: |
See below |
| Special Defenses: |
See below |
| Magic Resistance: |
nil |
| Size: |
Medium (5-6' tall) |
| Morale: |
18 |
| XP Value: |
5,000 |
Appearance A barrow-wight is a form of level draining undead, similar in appearance to a wraith. Barrow-wights have a powerful connection to the negative material plane, but this contact is weakened when the creature separates its spirit from its flesh. When separated, the body can drain experience levels, but only if both fists strike the target in the same round. Each drained level is transferred to the barrow-wight's incorporeal form, and it gains one HD.
If a barrow-wight's corporeal form is killed, it may reanimate that form, using stored energy from drained mortals. Any barrow-wight has 1d4+1 levels stored from previous encounters (they can store these levels indefinitely), plus however many levels they managed to drain during the encounter.
The corporeal form may be reanimated as long as even a scrap of it remains. The reanimation process takes 1 round. The only way of completely destroying a barrow-wight is to destroy the incorporeal form. The incorporeal form remains on the border ethereal, however, so Player Characters cannot hope to defeat it unless: a) the body is destroyed and the incorporeal form manifests; or (b) the Player Character can travel to the border ethereal.
If the barrow-wight's corporeal form is destroyed and it possess no stored levels with which to reanimate it, the incorporeal form will manifest and attack. The incorporeal barrow-wight may drain levels, but only on a roll of a natural 20. At this time, however, it will drain 1d2 levels of experience.
If an incorporeal barrow-wight manages to drain levels, it will immediately go ethereal. From the ethereal plane, it will reanimate its slain corporeal form, and attack through it once more. Each time it is forced to leave the border ethereal, its goal will be to drain levels, then return and reanimate its body.
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